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[StormBirdRising]

The moderator would have to be impartial. If that is not possible then it shouldn't be reopened. And there should be a disclaimer in the first post that the first personal attack on another member will be the last because the thread will be shut down immediately and not reopened.

[Fuzzbucket]

The moderator would have to be impartial. If that is not possible then it shouldn't be reopened. And there should be a disclaimer in the first post that the first personal attack on another member will be the last because the thread will be shut down immediately and not reopened.

Mods are entitled to their views and they are entitled to express them, just like any other member.

 

The last sentence I agree with.

Edited November 13, 2016 by fuzzbucket

[StormBirdRising]

I have moderated many forums, and debates and discussions in R/L and if the moderator is not impartial there is no meaningful discussion or debate, and there is no point to it.

 

A judge is entitled to her opinion, but not when she is deciding a case, then she must be impartial when evidence and testimony are being given and when the verdict (if it is a bench trial) is rendered.

[Fuzzbucket]

I have moderated many forums, and debates and discussions in R/L and if the moderator is not impartial there is no meaningful discussion or debate, and there is no point to it.

 

A judge is entitled to her opinion, but not when she is deciding a case, then she must be impartial when evidence and testimony are being given and when the verdict (if it is a bench trial) is rendered.

The mod can - and should - be able to express their views. They need only make it clear that the views are theirs and not "those of the forum as a whole." This isn't a court of law; no one has committed a crime, and no-one is going to jail.

 

But your posts are making me reconsider my view.

 

The other two forums I'm on where we are discussing this, the mods have VERY strong views and are expressing them. WE all get to treat their views just as we do those of any other member. And if someone calls another member something inappropriate, or flames them, those same mods will pull the posts - even if they come from their own side of the fence. THAT's what impartiality in modding means - treating everyone the same, whether you agree with them or not. It does not mean having to be silenced because you are a mod.

[StormBirdRising]

A person moderating any thread or any forum needs to be impartial.

[diaveborn]

What specific problems have you encountered because of impartiality? You mention not having meaningful discussion/debate but I don't think there was a lack of that, maybe we have different definitions.

[SullenCat]

The moderator would have to be impartial. If that is not possible then it shouldn't be reopened. And there should be a disclaimer in the first post that the first personal attack on another member will be the last because the thread will be shut down immediately and not reopened.

That's quite funny. So... people can't be trusted to post without a mod "policing" the thread??? And who decides that the mod is "impartial"? One of the posters? And what is a "personal attack" and who decides that? Where did Freedom of Speech go???

Frankly, all those constraints sound like an effort to just shut up opinions. And posts.

[Fuzzbucket]

A person moderating any thread or any forum needs to be impartial.

No-one in this world is impartial. I know from being in that thread that you aren't. That's not a criticism, but it showed. Still, you were able to police forums while holding the beliefs you expressed in the election thread. You weren't impartial; you had views, and I don't believe you were able to completely sublimate them while moderating - humans can't compartmentalise like that.

 

What I assume you mean is that they have to moderate in an impartial fashion. That does not preclude their posting their own views.

[purpledragonclaw]

Basically I'm just saying that IMNVHO the thread should be reopened, given that many people seem to want it, and left to run unless a real flame war starts up. There are at least two other mods who monitor GD.

I am a moderator that monitors the thread, but I am not a GD moderator and thus can't directly moderate it. I can make reports, but that's about it.

 

Moderators are people too, and asking us to be impartial on any subject is unrealistic. We can be professional while expressing our opinions in any thread without affecting our ability to do our jobs here. This is an issue that affects everyone, and telling moderators to be impartial is not going to happen.

 

I am still on the fence about re-opening the thread right now, since it's still such a charged topic, and due to that the thread will need more moderating than most to make sure things don't get out of hand. If the mods can't handle that right now, it should stay closed.

[Sundew]

a mod should be able to express their opinion in a topic like any other member. to say otherwise is silly. no one's monitoring a debate, we don't need a decisive outcome or impartial judge. we need someone to handle things if anyone gets out of hand, but you don't need to have no opinion on politics to be able to tell that flaming and making death threats are bad. just like mods can give their own advice in the advice thread or talk about their own problems in the emotional support thread, they can express their political views in the politics thread.

 

the politics thread should get a little more attention just because everyone is currently so worked up and because the topic has had trouble in the past. there are rules set in place already. having a mod look at a thread isn't censorship or policing opinions, it's how a forum works. and if a mod does make a bad decision you can call them out here, like people have already done.

 

i support reopening the election thread.

[SullenCat]

Moderators are people too, and asking us to be impartial on any subject is unrealistic.

Interesting. And sad. So... a thread can't be re-opened because mods do not trust themselves to be impartial. Right. Actually, not.

Edited November 13, 2016 by SullenCat

[diaveborn]

So... a thread can't be re-opened because mods do not trust themselves to be impartial.

That's not the reason it's not re-opened though. see here

Edited November 13, 2016 by diaveborn

[SullenCat]

That's not the reason it's not re-opened though. see here

I opened your link, saw no reasons to not have the thread re-opened. Just state why, with bullet points, so we all can understand.

[purpledragonclaw]

Interesting. And sad. So... a thread can't be re-opened because mods do not trust themselves to be impartial. Right. Actually, not.

 

Actually, what I said was that asking mods to be impartial on any subject is unrealistic, not that the thread should stay closed because mods can't be impartial. I then followed that statement up with this:

 

We can be professional while expressing our opinions in any thread without affecting our ability to do our jobs here.

 

Sock gave the reason for why she closed the thread (she gave 3 reasons why the thread was closed, with reasons 2 and 3 being why I believe the thread is still closed), and she even mentioned the possibility of re-opening it once mods can monitor it again.

 

 

[diaveborn]

I opened your link, saw no reasons to not have the thread re-opened. Just state why, with bullet points, so we all can understand.

Did you go through to the other link, the thread-closing post? There appears to be no currently available mods to moderate the thread, and the setup here on DC is that threads need to be modded. I don't get the confusion.

[SullenCat]

Did you go through to the other link, the thread-closing post? There appears to be no currently available mods to moderate the thread, and the setup here on DC is that threads need to be modded. I don't get the confusion.

I did check the link.

Please, just assume that I can't figure out why (too dumb) and post the reasons. Summarized bullet points would be great.

Unless the reason is "no available mods", no modding, no posts. I'm trying to take that reason seriously but having a laughing-a-lot problem with it.

[hazeh]

We hear you. Trust me, I know you all want to discuss it. But Sock and I are the ones who take care of GD for the most part, and both of us are highly affected by the outcome of this election. I cannot speak on Sock's behalf, but I had an extremely difficult time reading some of those replies and felt I was not suitable for moderating the topic at that given time. There are other mods available, but they are also busy moderating other issues and cannot devote all of their time to a topic that is this sensitive in nature. Please bear with us for a while. Thank you, friends.

 

 

[ladyvidel]

I want to thank you Haze and Sock as well for taking the time to care for yourselves as well as look out for us, even if it's not in ways that others might think of. That helps make this forum community so awesome.

[Fuzzbucket]

I am still on the fence about re-opening the thread right now, since it's still such a charged topic, and due to that the thread will need more moderating than most to make sure things don't get out of hand. If the mods can't handle that right now, it should stay closed.

I am no longer on the fence. Let's don't open it. It will be closed again in short order, judging by posts even talking ABOUT it. There is IRC, there is chatzy, and someone could even start up a new free forum just to talk about it. But I say again - to expect mods to be impartial is totally not OK. To be professional and even handed is what is required, not sainthood.

 

I have wondered before why we have the GD section at all, and now I wonder even more. This forum is connected to a GAME we all play. I for one am going to go play the game this place is all about.

 

 

[Cinnamin Draconna]

Personally, I wish this entire forum was strictly GAME RELATED.. including discussion about other games. And since ART is an important part of our game, we should have art subforums too.

 

But I wish that anything related to real life could just be banned. I'm not interested in your problems and I don't want to discuss mine with strangers either. If you need to talk about something from real life, go find a forum that's dedicated to that issue. This is the Dragon Cave forum and I'm here to play the game, talk about the game and other game related things ONLY.

[andromedae]

In my particular opinion I like that these forums encompass both General Discussion and Site-wide topics. It adds to the forum's diversity, and upon my impression it creates a sense of union among members. One can choose what areas of the forum to engage with and which ones they prefer to withdraw from. There will be, of course, topics that only further highlight our differences, and said topics should be kept either strictly moderated so as not to cause greater disruptions within the community or simply shut down. After all, the forum is based on Dragon Cave, the site, and it is not a priority to keep such topics alive if they cannot continue without proper debate. A debate that does not involve personal attacks against other members but is instead an intellectually based discussion rather than one that is emotional. Every user has a right to express themselves freely, however there is a difference between freedom of speech and speech that is meant to inflict damage upon others. The idea of DC as a community is to co-exist in peace.

Edited November 13, 2016 by andromedae

[Guillotine]

I don't mind the existence of the general discussion forums, even if I don't generally use them, but I do think that certain topics should probably be avoided just because of how... volatile... they get.

[Infinis]

I have wondered before why we have the GD section at all, and now I wonder even more. This forum is connected to a GAME we all play. I for one am going to go play the game this place is all about.

 

Honestly it would be kind of boring to have only game-related things on this forum. I like that we are like many other game forums in that we don't have only game-related discussions.

 

Ultimately it's a user choice to participate in GD, so if you don't like to discuss non-DC stuff, you don't have to and you can just ignore it. But I don't think that it's a good idea to not have them; I'd rather see GD split into two forums, one for serious discussion and one for non-serious discussion. That way people can still converse without having to deal with serious stuff - leave that to people who want discuss those issues.

 

Besides, not everyone here is really interested in discussing the game. I'm pretty solitary as far as the game goes, so the only thing I usually go into SD for is trading...

 

 

[Nine]

The idea of censoring or outright banning certain debatable topics, just because of the possibility of becoming 'volatile', is almost insulting. It's an insinuation that the community is not mature enough, not trusted enough to partake in discussions that may have differences of opinion-- that the majority of people here are too immature to control and express their emotions and have to be babied like children. Well, moreso than it currently is.

 

I all too vividly remember when the mods were seriously considering removing all debate topics and anything close to a mature theme from GD, and the long hours spent trying to explain why doing that is such a bad idea. Eventually everyone came to an agreeable solution. I really hope we're not coming full-circle and returning to that mentality. If you don't want to participate in such topics or find yourself unable to handle a difference of opinion, no matter what it may be, you have all the freedom in the world to not click, view, and read such topics. Take the initiative and moderate yourself by recognizing your boiling points, take a step back from the computer and take a breather, or just avoid conversations that might upset you.

 

By the way, didn't we just have a new batch of mods hired? Are we still so short that only one or two have entire forums under their command? Do we need moderators to "double-dip" and be give more freedom across several boards? Psuedo-mods who can act as mediators in the event a moderator is not available (and won't be reprimanded for situational mini-modding)?

 

If we can have calm debates on abortion, veganism, cruelty to animals, and sexualities, I don't see any reason politics should be removed. I'm not even that personally invested in discussing politics, but there is no reason overly emotional, angry, offensive, or insulting posts/users can't be dealt with on an individual basis like any other topic instead of collectively shutting the entire thing down. It's too easy to just wipe your hands of a situation that may be uncomfortable or difficult; finding a proper medium or solution that benefits both parties is worth the effort, imo.

[Jazeki]

In this instance, Haze is the standard mod for the section and Sock was the one "double dipping" as it were. I probably won't be returning to the thread, but I do feel it should be reopened. I also feel that this is an example of where mods need to be hired equally across the board because clearly we are short on general discussion mods if one person is left to moderate several sections encompassing "general discussion" and threads have to be locked because of it.